Apple Home Collection Is Apple Curating Your Smart Home. The Front Door Is the Real Product
Apple Home Collection is a lineup of LG and Schneider Electric cameras, a video doorbell, a smart lock and thermostats set up with one tap from iPhone. Prices start at $39.95, availability begins in December, and some products slip to early 2027.
For years the hardest part of building an Apple smart home has had nothing to do with Apple hardware. It was the doorbell that wanted its own app, the camera that wanted its own subscription, and the lock that worked with the Home app until a firmware update decided otherwise. Apple Home Collection is Apple's attempt to fix that without building the accessories itself, and the interesting question is how much of the old mess it actually removes.
Announced today alongside Apple HomeView, Apple Home Collection is a lineup of cameras, a video doorbell, a smart deadbolt, thermostats and room sensors designed in collaboration with LG Electronics and Schneider Electric. Availability begins in December at apple.com, in the Apple Store app and in Apple Store locations, with select accessories arriving in early 2027. Apple has not said which products fall into the later group.
The lineup and prices
LG makes the cameras, the doorbell, the lock, one thermostat and a temperature sensor. Schneider Home, from Schneider Electric, makes the other thermostat and a room sensor. Prices start at $39.95 for a sensor and top out at $399.95 for the floodlight camera.
| Product | Starts at (U.S.) | Colors | Regions |
|---|---|---|---|
| LG Video Doorbell Wired | $249.95 | Essence Graphite, Essence Silver | U.S., Canada, UK |
| LG Floodlight Cam | $399.95 | Essence Graphite, Essence Silver | U.S., Canada, UK |
| LG Outdoor Cam Plug-In | $299.95 | Essence Graphite, Essence Silver | U.S., Canada, UK |
| LG Indoor Cam Plug-In | $199.95 | Essence White | U.S., Canada, UK |
| LG Smart Deadbolt Lock | $349.95 | Essence Graphite, Essence Silver | U.S., Canada |
| LG Smart Thermostat | $199.95 | Essence White | U.S., Canada |
| LG Temperature Sensor | $39.95 | Essence White | U.S., Canada |
| Schneider Home Smart Thermostat | $199.95 | Silver + White | U.S., Canada |
| Schneider Home Room Sensor | $39.95 | White | U.S., Canada |
Source: Apple Newsroom, October 13, 2026. Thermostat installation accessories sold separately: LG C‑Wire Power Adapter $24.95, Schneider Home Trim Plate $14.95, Schneider Home C‑Wire Power Adapter $24.95.
What makes it different from Works with Apple Home
Apple has certified third party accessories for years, and the Home app already supports thousands of Works with Apple Home and Matter devices. Home Collection goes further in three specific ways. Setup starts with a single tap from an iPhone, using NFC pairing, and everything is managed in the Home app with no separate app to download and no separate account to create. Every product supports Thread and automatically updates its network credentials if you change your Wi‑Fi, which removes one of the most tedious chores in any smart home. And Home app data is end to end encrypted, so Apple says neither LG, Schneider Electric nor Apple can read it.
The cameras make the subscription question simpler. All four record up to 2.5K video, recognize people, familiar faces, pets, vehicles and packages, and store 10 days of event history in iCloud+ with no separate camera subscription. Apple's footnotes spell out the limits: the 50GB iCloud+ plan supports one camera, 200GB supports up to five, and 2TB supports an unlimited number. On eligible plans, Apple Intelligence adds video descriptions and natural language search of footage. Built in storage keeps recording through a Wi‑Fi outage.
The front door is the real product
The most thoughtful piece is how the doorbell and lock work together. LG's Smart Deadbolt Lock uses Ultra Wideband to tell when someone with a home key on a compatible iPhone or Apple Watch is approaching, and unlocks without a tap. It also supports tap to unlock, a PIN pad and a hidden backup key, senses whether the door is open, closed or tampered with, and shares guest access through the Home app. It is Matter compatible, supports Aliro and works entirely locally, so core access keeps working without internet.
Pair it with LG's Video Doorbell, which uses a 2.5K front camera and a full HD bottom camera for packages, and the Home app treats them as one front door system: see who is there, talk to them and unlock from a single view or by asking Siri. The chime plays through HomeView, HomePod and HomePod mini. Together the two cost $599.90 at starting prices, which puts Apple's front door squarely in premium territory.
Climate control without a schedule
The two thermostats, from LG and Schneider Home, both start at $199.95 and both lean on Adaptive Temperature, which uses on device intelligence from your iPhone to adjust based on whether someone is home, winding down or away. In the contiguous U.S., Clean Energy Guidance can shift heating and cooling to cleaner, lower cost periods on a compatible utility plan. The thermostats can read temperature and humidity from the new standalone sensors or from sensors already built into HomeView, HomePod and HomePod mini, which quietly gives existing HomePod owners a reason to keep those speakers around. Both are Matter compatible, with on device wire detection to simplify installation, and C‑wire adapters and a trim plate are sold separately.
What you need in your home
Home Collection accessories require an iPhone running the latest operating system software for NFC pairing, and Apple says additional features vary by accessory and require a compatible home hub such as Apple HomeView, HomePod or Apple TV. Video summaries and natural language search also require setup from an Apple Intelligence enabled iPhone or iPad and an eligible iCloud+ plan. If your home is still on the older Home architecture, our home prep guide walks through the upgrade, and the new Apple TV 4K and HomePod mini 2 both work as hubs.
Regional availability is narrower than for Apple's own devices. The cameras and doorbell are listed for the U.S., Canada and the UK; the lock, thermostats and sensors for the U.S. and Canada only. For anyone who would rather not drill into a door frame, Apple Retail now offers third party installation from ADT for an additional charge, in the U.S. starting this fall.
Who should wait for it
If you are about to buy a doorbell, a lock or a thermostat for an Apple home, waiting until December is the obvious call, if only to compare. If you already run solid Matter or Works with Apple Home accessories, there is little reason to rip them out; Home Collection's advantages are setup, credential handling and the integrated front door experience, and those matter most when starting fresh. Outside the U.S. and Canada, the lock and thermostats are not listed at all yet.
What to watch next
December brings the first products, and the details still missing are the ones that matter most: which accessories slip to early 2027, how they hold up in real homes, and whether more partners join LG and Schneider Electric. Apple has chosen to curate the smart home instead of manufacturing it. If the setup really is one tap and the front door really works offline, that may turn out to be the smarter bet.
For the rest of the day's news, read our roundup of everything Apple announced at its Welcome home event.